Lamentations 3:51

They said to me, “The remnant who are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem is also broken down, and its gates are burned with fire.”

“ ‘The sword is outside, and the pestilence and the famine within. He who is in the field will die by the sword. He who is in the city will be devoured by famine and pestilence.

You will eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and of your daughters, whom Yahweh your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies will distress you.

Pharaoh sent and called for Moses and Aaron, and said to them, “I have sinned this time. Yahweh is righteous, and I and my people are wicked.

You will eat the flesh of your sons, and you will eat the flesh of your daughters.

Therefore he brought on them the king of the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or gray-headed. He gave them all into his hand.

One will devour on the right hand, and be hungry; and he will eat on the left hand, and they will not be satisfied. Everyone will eat the flesh of his own arm:

The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children. They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.

Now in the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, in the fifth day of the month, as I was among the captives by the river Chebar, the heavens were opened, and I saw visions of God.

“ ‘Moreover I will make you a desolation and a reproach among the nations that are around you, in the sight of all that pass by.

I went out by night by the valley gate, even toward the jackal’s well, then to the dung gate, and inspected the walls of Jerusalem, which were broken down, and its gates were consumed with fire.

They have shed their blood like water around Jerusalem. There was no one to bury them.

Therefore they will eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own schemes.

The dead bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth. No one will frighten them away.

Therefore I will give their wives to others and their fields to those who will possess them. For everyone from the least even to the greatest is given to covetousness; from the prophet even to the priest everyone deals falsely.

You are righteous, Yahweh, when I contend with you; yet I would like to reason the cause with you. Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why are they all at ease who deal very treacherously?

I will dash them one against another, even the fathers and the sons together,” says Yahweh: “I will not pity, spare, or have compassion, that I should not destroy them.” ’ ”

Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and give them over to the power of the sword. Let their wives become childless and widows. Let their men be killed and their young men struck by the sword in battle.

“Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look, and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which is brought on me, with which Yahweh has afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.

“Look, Yahweh; for I am in distress. My heart is troubled. My heart turns over within me, for I have grievously rebelled. Abroad, the sword bereaves. At home, it is like death.

“You have covered us with anger and pursued us. You have killed. You have not pitied.

Therefore the fathers will eat the sons within you, and the sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you; and I will scatter the whole remnant of you to all the winds.

For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land,” says Yahweh; “but, behold, I will deliver the men everyone into his neighbor’s hand, and into the hand of his king. They will strike the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.”

For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city will be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go out into captivity, and the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.

“ ‘But if you will not listen to me, and will not do all these commandments,

Yahweh will bring you, and your king whom you will set over yourselves, to a nation that you have not known, you nor your fathers. There you will serve other gods of wood and stone.

I gathered them together to the river that runs to Ahava; and there we encamped three days: and I looked around at the people and the priests, and found there were none of the sons of Levi.

Now while Ezra prayed and made confession, weeping and casting himself down before God’s house, there was gathered together to him out of Israel a very great assembly of men and women and children; for the people wept very bitterly.

When I heard these words, I sat down and wept, and mourned several days; and I fasted and prayed before the God of heaven,

For how can I endure to see the evil that would come to my people? How can I endure to see the destruction of my relatives?”

You make us a reproach to our neighbors, a scoffing and a derision to those who are around us.

We have become a reproach to our neighbors, a scoffing and derision to those who are around us.

Yahweh, I know that your judgments are righteous, that in faithfulness you have afflicted me.

Streams of tears run down my eyes, because they don’t observe your law.

Their infants also will be dashed in pieces before their eyes. Their houses will be ransacked, and their wives raped.

You that are full of shouting, a tumultuous city, a joyous town; your slain are not slain with the sword, neither are they dead in battle.

“Come down and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you will no longer be called tender and delicate.

Those who will be of you will build the old waste places. You will raise up the foundations of many generations. You will be called Repairer of the Breach, Restorer of Paths with Dwellings.

The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?

“For from their least even to their greatest, everyone is given to covetousness. From the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.

Don’t go out into the field or walk by the way; for the sword of the enemy and terror are on every side.

But if you will not hear it, my soul will weep in secret for your pride. My eye will weep bitterly, and run down with tears, because Yahweh’s flock has been taken captive.

“They will die grievous deaths. They will not be lamented, neither will they be buried. They will be as dung on the surface of the ground. They will be consumed by the sword and by famine. Their dead bodies will be food for the birds of the sky and for the animals of the earth.”

I will even give them up to be tossed back and forth among all the kingdoms of the earth for evil; to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places where I will drive them.

They came in and possessed it, but they didn’t obey your voice and didn’t walk in your law. They have done nothing of all that you commanded them to do. Therefore you have caused all this evil to come upon them.

For I will punish those who dwell in the land of Egypt, as I have punished Jerusalem, by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence;

Therefore her young men will fall in her streets, and all the men of war will be brought to silence in that day,” says Yahweh of Armies.

The Lord has swallowed up all the dwellings of Jacob without pity. He has thrown down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah. He has brought them down to the ground. He has profaned the kingdom and its princes.

Yahweh has done that which he planned. He has fulfilled his word that he commanded in the days of old. He has thrown down, and has not pitied. He has caused the enemy to rejoice over you. He has exalted the horn of your adversaries.

“Look, Yahweh, and see to whom you have done thus! Should the women eat their offspring, the children that they held and bounced on their knees? Should the priest and the prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?

Yahweh said to him, “Go through the middle of the city, through the middle of Jerusalem, and set a mark on the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry over all the abominations that are done within it.”

“You, son of man, shouldn’t it be in the day when I take from them their strength, the joy of their glory, the desire of their eyes, and that whereupon they set their heart, their sons and their daughters,

“I sent plagues among you like I did Egypt. I have slain your young men with the sword, and have carried away your horses; and I filled your nostrils with the stench of your camp, yet you haven’t returned to me,” says Yahweh.

In that day the beautiful virgins and the young men will faint for thirst.

that I have great sorrow and unceasing pain in my heart.

For many walk, of whom I told you often, and now tell you even weeping, as the enemies of the cross of Christ,

For how will I go up to my father, if the boy isn’t with me?—lest I see the evil that will come on my father.”

Moses told his father-in-law all that Yahweh had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, all the hardships that had come on them on the way, and how Yahweh delivered them.

You will be cursed in the city, and you will be cursed in the field.

They shall be wasted with hunger, and devoured with burning heat and bitter destruction. I will send the teeth of animals on them, with the venom of vipers that glide in the dust.

She said, “As Yahweh your God lives, I don’t have a cake, but a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a jar. Behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and bake it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die.”

Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. The famine was severe in Samaria.

There was a great famine in Samaria. Behold, they besieged it, until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.

If we say, ‘We will enter into the city,’ then the famine is in the city, and we will die there. If we sit still here, we also die. Now therefore come, and let’s surrender to the army of the Syrians. If they save us alive, we will live; and if they kill us, we will only die.”

One of his servants answered, “Please let some people take five of the horses that remain, which are left in the city. Behold, they are like all the multitude of Israel who are left in it. Behold, they are like all the multitude of Israel who are consumed. Let’s send and see.”

Then we departed from the river Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month, to go to Jerusalem. The hand of our God was on us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy and the bandit by the way.

I said to the king, “Let the king live forever! Why shouldn’t my face be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers’ tombs, lies waste, and its gates have been consumed with fire?”

Then I said to them, “You see the bad situation that we are in, how Jerusalem lies waste, and its gates are burned with fire. Come, let’s build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we won’t be disgraced.”

“Remember, my God, Tobiah and Sanballat according to these their works, and also the prophetess Noadiah, and the rest of the prophets, that would have put me in fear.”

These things I remember, and pour out my soul within me, how I used to go with the crowd, and led them to God’s house, with the voice of joy and praise, a multitude keeping a holy day.

Do well in your good pleasure to Zion. Build the walls of Jerusalem.

Pay back to our neighbors seven times into their bosom their reproach with which they have reproached you, Lord.

For your servants take pleasure in her stones, and have pity on her dust.

Those who sow in tears will reap in joy.

By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down. Yes, we wept, when we remembered Zion.

a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;

Your men shall fall by the sword, and your mighty in the war.

Your children hurry. Your destroyers and those who devastated you will leave you.

therefore Yahweh of Armies says, ‘Behold, I will punish them. The young men will die by the sword. Their sons and their daughters will die by famine.

“Take the belt that you have bought, which is on your waist, and arise, go to the Euphrates, and hide it there in a cleft of the rock.”

The people to whom they prophesy will be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword. They will have no one to bury them—them, their wives, their sons, or their daughters, for I will pour their wickedness on them.

If I go out into the field, then, behold, the slain with the sword! If I enter into the city, then, behold, those who are sick with famine! For both the prophet and the priest go about in the land, and have no knowledge.’ ”

I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters. They will each eat the flesh of his friend in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies, and those who seek their life, will distress them.” ’

I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings, says Yahweh; and I will kindle a fire in her forest, and it will devour all that is around her.’ ”

Therefore Yahweh, the God of Israel, says against the shepherds who feed my people: “You have scattered my flock, driven them away, and have not visited them. Behold, I will visit on you the evil of your doings,” says Yahweh.

I didn’t send these prophets, yet they ran. I didn’t speak to them, yet they prophesied.

Then the king of Babylon killed Zedekiah’s sons in Riblah before his eyes. The king of Babylon also killed all the nobles of Judah.

“Yahweh is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment. Please hear all you peoples, and see my sorrow. My virgins and my young men have gone into captivity.

“The youth and the old man lie on the ground in the streets. My virgins and my young men have fallen by the sword. You have killed them in the day of your anger. You have slaughtered, and not pitied.

They ravished the women in Zion, the virgins in the cities of Judah.

Yahweh’s word came to Ezekiel the priest, the son of Buzi, in the land of the Chaldeans by the river Chebar; and Yahweh’s hand was there on him.

Then I came to them of the captivity at Tel Aviv, that lived by the river Chebar, and to where they lived; and I sat there overwhelmed among them seven days.

Those of you that escape will remember me among the nations where they are carried captive, how I have been broken with their lewd heart, which has departed from me, and with their eyes, which play the prostitute after their idols. Then they will loathe themselves in their own sight for the evils which they have committed in all their abominations.

The Spirit lifted me up, and brought me in the vision by the Spirit of God into Chaldea, to the captives. So the vision that I had seen went up from me.

In covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words: whose sentence now from of old doesn’t linger, and their destruction will not slumber.